


Does This Please You?

by todisturbtheuniverse



Category: Dragon Age (Video Games), Dragon Age - All Media Types, Dragon Age: Origins - Awakening
Genre: Bad Flirting, Flirting, Fluff, M/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2014-03-12
Updated: 2014-03-12
Packaged: 2018-01-15 10:31:43
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,216
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/1301659
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/todisturbtheuniverse/pseuds/todisturbtheuniverse
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Prompted by quequieresmrmorden on Tumblr: Zevran/Nathaniel Howe shippy anything, with optional smooshiness and/or angst welcome.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Does This Please You?

**Author's Note:**

> Features my Amell as Warden-Commander, takes place during Awakening.

"Does this please you?" Nathaniel grouched, back aching, and straightened up.

The Warden-Commander brushed past him to get at the chest he’d just painstakingly opened, rooting around in it without a word. Disgruntled, he turned back toward the rest of the party, prepared to share a commiserating look with Anders, since the mage was good for that sort of thing—

But there was an extra body a few paces behind their little group: an elf with shoulder-length blond hair, clever brown eyes, and a tattoo like an ocean wave down one cheek. Without much thought, Nathaniel drew his bow. Better to aim first and ask questions later, never mind that the elf hadn’t bothered to draw his daggers.

Oghren belched. “Don’t wet yourself, boy,” he rumbled. “It’s only the Antivan.”

That meant nothing at all to Nathaniel, and since Oghren couldn’t always be relied upon to tell the difference between an enemy and an overgrown bush, he only lowered the point of his arrow a fraction. The Commander, though, let out a little yelp of surprise.

"Zevran!" she exclaimed, and abandoned the chest with its contents rifled about to dart past Nathaniel. In the next moment, her arms were wrapped fiercely around his neck. He chuckled heartily as he drew back to look at her.

"I’ve missed you too, my dear, but I see that you’ve already found someone else to open locks for you," he joked, looking over her shoulder at Nathaniel.

"And he’s better at it than you were!" she laughed.

He  _harrumphed_. “Tell me, did he try to kill you, too?”

"That’s how I meet all my best friends," she declared, looping her arm through Zevran’s.

Finally, Nathaniel lowered his bow. “Is this a habit with you?” he asked, unable to help sounding a little grouchy. “Do you have a death wish?”

Her eyes danced. “We all do,” she reminded. “Let’s go back to the Keep, and we can catch up. Have you heard from Leliana?” She said the name like an Orlesian.

Zevran drew a thick bundle of parchment from within his armor. The Commander’s face brightened as she snatched it from him. “She is well,” he reassured her.

"He’s a Crow," Nathaniel muttered to Oghren as they followed the pair back to the road. "Isn’t he?"

Oghren grunted. “Not anymore.”

*

"Your father sent me to kill her, you know."

Nathaniel paused in the midst of picking another lock, stilled the sudden tremble in his hands, and went back to convincing the mechanism. “The world is full of happy coincidences,” he replied.

The assassin had promised the Commander that he would stay for a few days, and so here he was, tagging along while they investigated the Wending Wood. Nathaniel found that he didn’t like the former Crow much. He chatted entirely too much, laughed entirely too often, and kept giving Nathaniel peculiarly interested looks.

He was good with a dagger, though, and Nathaniel could grudgingly admit that there was a reason the Commander liked having him around.

"Mmm," Zevran agreed, just as the lock clicked open.

Nathaniel opened the chest himself and rifled through it for anything interesting. He didn’t see how this was necessary, exactly, but he thought it was probably a holdover from that long year the Commander had spent as little better than an outlaw, and given his grudging respect for her, he was inclined to indulge her.

"But you seem a better sort than him," Zevran continued. "He was cold. Like a lizard."

Nathaniel’s hands clenched, just momentarily, in a bit of torn leather armor. He shifted it aside, letting the heat of his anger roll through him.

"You, though," the assassin observed. "Cold doesn’t suit you."

Nathaniel straightened up. “Go harass someone else, Crow,” he invited. “I don’t need you to tell me who I am.”

A smirk tugged up the corner of Zevran’s mouth. “Indeed you don’t,” he replied, and trotted back to where the Commander stood on a nearby hill, surveying the damage.

*

"You are too soft with her."

"What is it  _now_ , Zevran?” Nathaniel asked tiredly, drooping over his supper. He disliked when they strayed too far from the Keep to return to it at night; he was no stranger to camping, but he’d grown fond of the bed that was his.

Zevran chuckled. They were on first watch, their companions asleep nearby. Sigrun snored loudly. That was the other thing he missed about nights at the Keep, Nathaniel thought sadly. Solid stone walls.

"It’s always  _does this please you_ , so resentfully,” Zevran replied. “But she’s immune to that sort of remark. She appreciates sarcasm too much to reassure you. I bet she asks you to pick locks on the off chance that you’ll say it again.”

Nathaniel set his bowl down and settled his bow on his lap, deciding to ignore the elf.

"She was always that way with Leliana, you know," Zevran went on. "Pretending to be oblivious when she was anything but. It was always entertaining to watch. I am glad to see that she has not gotten out of the habit. It adds to her personality, I think."

When Nathaniel didn’t respond, Zevran  _harrumphed_ and shifted around. “You aren’t very chatty,” he observed.

"And you’re far too chatty, for a man who makes his living by stealthily killing people,” Nathaniel replied.

Zevran chuckled. “He has teeth! And I am retired, my friend.”

Nathaniel raised his eyebrows. “I very much doubt that.”

"Perhaps that was misleading," Zevran agreed. "I am retired from the  _Crows_. I still kill people. Quietly, believe it or not.”

"I don’t believe that," Nathaniel said, watching the treeline.

"We ought to have a kinship, you and I," Zevran said, ignoring this. "Once upon a time, we both tried to kill our dear friend, over there. She spared our lives. It’s an exclusive sort of club, you see."

"Really. Who else is in it, then?"

"Well." Zevran examined one of his daggers. "You. And I. As I said, it’s a very exclusive club. It’s nice to have another member."

"I didn’t get very close to killing her," Nathaniel said tiredly. "I hardly count."

"Truth be told, neither did I," Zevran admitted. "She is…lethal. I don’t think I had a chance." He paused, then went on, in a curiously coy tone of voice, "I very much enjoy lethal things."

Nathaniel glanced sideways at him. The elf’s brown eyes were half-lidded, lazy, watching him with the vaguest spark of curiosity. “You’re an assassin,” he said slowly, wondering where in Thedas this was going.

"Mmm," Zevran agreed. "You, my friend, are quite lethal. I believe I’ve never seen such a proficient with a bow."

The way he said it was—off. Sultry, almost. Nathaniel flushed the instant the thought crossed his mind and batted it back.

"What are you getting at?" he asked.

Zevran laughed. “So straightforward. A man can appreciate that. But surely I’ve been perfectly clear—I like lethal things. You happen to be lethal. Perhaps I quite like you. Would that be unacceptable?”

Nathaniel scrambled to his feet. Zevran looked up at him, a coy smile playing around his mouth. “I’m,” Nathaniel said, mouth dry, “I’m going to—fill my water.” He snatched his canteen off the ground.

"I’ll be here," Zevran said, his eyes dancing.


End file.
